I’m in the market for a new holiday bike, there are some decent deals on the early 2018/19 bikes at the moment, I’ve had a look at the reviews and the main ones that pop up are a little scathing, so I thought I’d ask here if you guys rate them?

I’ve had a 2017/18 factory for quite about 18 months now. It’s superb. A proper obliterator of terrain. Climbs much better than my Alpine 160 ever did. X2 shock took a while to fettle, but once it was sorted I’ve not had to touch it. The perfect skills compensating gnarpoon for the overweight IT monkey who likes to make the fit whippets wait for him at the top of climbs and then steamrollers everything in sight on the descents. Love it.

I’m in the market for a new holiday bike

Is this the hot new trend? like the glamping version of bikepacking?

No way would I own a single pivot again, its nice to actually have functioning rear suspension when braking and not have loads of feedback through my feet in the rough stuff.

That comes from previously owning a nukeproof mega am and demoing a five and stage 5 recently.

Im sure I’ll get flamed and told to ride better, but at least demo one to see if you like the feel first.

Holiday bike is a thing, it’s by no means a new thing, I won’t have much opportunity to test one, I’ve had Hecklers 5’s and Patriots so I’m no stranger to single pivots.

“No way would I own a single pivot again, its nice to actually have functioning rear suspension when braking and not have loads of feedback through my feet in the rough stuff.”

The suspension behaviour under braking is pretty much the same for VPP, linkage driven single pivots, DW-link, Switch Infinity, and so on. The only bikes that don’t stiffen much under braking are four bars with common rotating links whose virtual pivot point projects a long way forwards.

And the popular new high pivots with idlers stiffen even more than everything else but still manage to win WC DH races!

http://linkagedesign.blogspot.com/2016/08/orange-alpine-6-275-2017.html

Where the orange has noticeably more pedal kickback and anti rise than any other system going?

The new high pivot bikes also have no pedal kickback and rearward axle paths, giving huge amounts of stability and preventing the bike stalling in holes, outweighing the increased anti rise to the pros, who are also incredibly good at braking in the right places.

I don’t entirely disagree about the pedal kickback – that’s always proportional to the anti-squat (if you don’t have an idler). But that’s not limited to single-pivot designs, anything where the anti-squat doesn’t decrease at you get deeper into the travel (so that’s all linkage-driven single pivots, DW’s DELTA and Split Pivot, Trek’s ABP, Cotic Droplink) and most four bar designs aren’t much better either.

The Alpine 6 does have rather a lot of anti-squat full stop, so it will have more pedal kickback than most.

One thing I’ve noticed with my most recent bike, is that it has much less anti-rise (aka brake squat also wrongly known as brake jack) than my old bike. So in theory it should have more rear tyre grip under braking. But in reality I preferred how the old bike squatted more, preserving its geometry. Fortunately I prefer everything else about the new bike! But I like bikes that let you brake really hard for brief moments without getting (literally) out of shape – I think it makes you ride better.

I’ve had a pre production Alpine 6 since July now, its a fantastic bike.
To be honest I’ve found the DPX2 better than the more expensive X2 and way easier to set up.

Part of my thinking was i have a mint CCDBIL cool in the correct size, I enjoyed my five with a coil and always felt quick on it.
Probably Rose tinted glasses.

The new Five has a 65 degree head angle,that’s aggressive enough for most Alpine riding.

Ah, an Orange thread – where people who’ve never owned your bike queue up to tell you how rubbish it is and how much you hate riding it.

I know a few folks on them.

great bikes, all ridden very hard. 50% had frame issues.

@godzilla try one. Where are you?

Can I comment as a Stage 6 owner and with a good pal who owns that generation Alpine?

Some observations…

1. It is way lighter than you probably expect.
2. It climbs like the proverbial rat up a drainpipe.
3. The ride feel is taut and precise. It’s a flick knife, not a shotgun.
4. Yes it does stiffen under braking.
5. It’s very fast and it’s taught me to brake less and KOMs have been won.
6. Hopping back on a four bar, I can go just as fast – but it’s not got the same interactive fun feedback.

HTH

I have one and must admit i love it! Ridden mine in the alps uplift days etc and it’s the only bike I use now. Pedal feedback is obvious but I don’t care I’m no Xc racing snake and I just grind it out on the hills to get the fun part! Took a while to fiddle with the rear shock to get it working well always shot through the travel, but that might be a problem with the shock rather than bike.

A mate has ridden mine and even though it was set up to stif for him he loved it and has one on order to replace his old 5.

Ooh, we haven’t had an orange bashing thread for a while. Bets on how long before the first filing cabinet reference.

Since getting back into riding off road in 2012 I’ve had 6 bikes that I’ve bought and subsequently sold. Through the wonders of Strava and Veloviewer I know exactly how much use I got out of each one. In terms of hours in the saddle, the results are:

2013 Five : 258
Mk2 Cotic Solaris : 127
2012 Trance : 121
Kinesis FF29 : 79
Mk2 Smuggler : 64
2006 Five : 45

The 2006 Five was second hand and I only sold it so quickly as I knew pretty much straight away that I wanted a new one.

Basically I kept the 2013 Five for twice as long as anything else and much longer than bikes that should have been better on paper. It’s also the only mountain bike that I still regret selling and would have back in a heartbeat.

For the record, my FlareMax is currently at 127 hours and I still love it, so it may yet overtake the Five. But for whatever reason that silly single pivot still holds the crown.

PS. I’ve used the X2 and the CCDB coil il. The X2 is slightly better IMO but needs to be set up right. Coil inline still very good.